Posts Tagged ‘games’

I actually sat down tonight and wrote down the list of games I want to play that are already out, games I would like to play through again, and games that i’m most excited for in 2013. The list ended up much longer than I expected primarily because of the steam sales over Christmas that filled my queue of games for the year.

Games I need to play ( kinda in order of how badly I want to play them )

Ni No Kuni

Mass Effect 3

Darksiders 2 ( Almost at the end: Finish )

Witcher 2

Legend of Grimrock

Borderlands 2 ( Currently Level 18: Finish )

Max Payne 3

Alan Wake

Civilization V

Sleeping Dogs

Fire Emblem: The Awakening

The Walking Dead

Saints Row: The Third

Tropico 4

Space Marine

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood

Batman Arkham City

Dark Souls: Prepare to Die Edition

Dota 2

Company of Heroes Tales of Valor campaign

Games that I would love to play through again

XCOM: Enemy Unknown ( I love this game )

Skyrim ( I want to roll a new character maybe try some DLC )

Company of Heroes ( Lets prepare for COH2 )

Short list of games i’m super excited for this year

Heart of the Swarm

Company of Heroes 2 ( Please still come out )

Dead Space 3

Bioshock Infinite

I’ve already got Heart of the Swarm preordered, I am itching to play that one. I really hope COH2 comes out this year after the sad news with THQ. I’m sure I missed some of the games that are due out this year, but honestly it seems like a slow year in releases, but I think the reason is primarily because the new consoles are right around the corner 🙂

Originally written in late 2009 by me, this essay still has a lot of really good points that still stand true today.

Porting a console game to a PC opens up a lot of opportunities to the developer, while also bringing up some interesting design choices. The first thing people think of when a game is being ported to the PC is that its going to have better graphics, but there is much more to a port than increasing the texture resolutions. There are several key system specific differences in consoles and computers such as memory requirements, increased graphic capabilities, and more powerful processors. Depending on the type of game being ported several design changes and adjustments may need to be made to maintain the same pacing as the console version such as, AI balancing, aim assist for shooters, menu navigation controls, and even accounting for the expectation of PC gamers.

The PC port of the game seems to start by making the game look crisper, mainly by increasing the texture resolutions across the board. PC version of games also can run at any number of resolutions which can result in a much more detailed experience for the player. Depending on the minimum system requirements for the PC port, the game can take advantage of more system and graphic memory. The Xbox 360 has 512MB of shared system and graphics memory, and a modern PC has many times that amount not shared, many PC games even provide a menu for the player to customize their game’s graphic quality. This level of customization and graphics improvements are things that PC gamers have come to expect when playing a PC game. (more…)